


Nocturne in D Flat Major

by TearoomSaloon



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Past Relationship(s), Third Semester (Persona 5), but current feelings, you kids have got the real shit: shared trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-15 08:14:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29681022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TearoomSaloon/pseuds/TearoomSaloon
Summary: In which two people who still love each other despite themselves discuss a relationship that never should have happened in the first place.
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Okumura Haru
Comments: 6
Kudos: 17





	Nocturne in D Flat Major

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to toy with an idea of 'what if they had gotten into a relationship of some kind before the betrayal happened and have to deal with the aftermath in third semester' and this is the nicer, fluffier outcome - I must satisfy my fluff craving before writing no-comfort angst.
> 
> This was an exercise in trying to write two characters who have feelings for each other without showing any of the relationship lead-up while still being a believable scenario to the audience. Critique is welcome but please be constructive!
> 
> He's either responsible for Kunikazu's death or not, whichever scenario makes it more plausible for you.

It was long after they had disbanded for the night when the call came in. Sitting up in bed, Ren squinted at the caller ID, half-blinded by the brightness of his screen. Drowsy, he picked up.

"Apologies, I know it's late but I can't sleep and need to ask a favor." Haru's voice was alert, as if she'd been pacing for hours. "I need to talk to Akechi before I can agree to this. Alone. Somewhere neutral."

He looked out his window at the dark alley below. Dim stars flickered in the cloudless sky, barely lighting the cobblestones. "Alone? Are you sure?"

"Yes." Her tone was firm. "It's a private matter."

"Of course," he said. "I just don't want you to feel uncomfortable by yourself."

She laughed dryly. "Have faith in me."

"I can lend you Leblanc Saturday evening." He would be night fishing with Ryuji and Kawakami, an odd activity that had become a regular ritual months prior. "Sojiro closes shop around eight and I shouldn't be back before midnight."

"Thank you, that will be more than enough time." The edge of her worry dulled. "I appreciate this, Ren."

"Don't worry about it. Let me know if you need me to come back earlier."

Morgana moved up to his pillow once he hung up. "That sounds like it's about more than just his betrayal."

"It is. They had an affair the whole time he was working with us." And it had been so painfully obvious that he had no idea how the rest of the group didn't pick up on it.

"So that creep infiltrated our ranks and still saw the need to extract information from her?"

"No, that's not what happened, hence she's looking for closure. We can talk about this later; we should sleep."

He was late arriving, nerves getting to his head before he made it to the train. They hadn't spoken alone since he'd had a meltdown in the engine room—at least, he didn't think. His memory at the end of December had fragmented, lost in this saccharine dream world. Maruki had promised an existence without suffering, yet he was so anxious he could puke. Why did he still care how she saw him? Why couldn't he _stop_ caring?

Haru was behind the bar when he entered, two hot cups streaming in the cold cafe. "I was wondering if we were going to have this conversation," he said as he pulled out a stool. "Is this one for me?"

"A peace offering." She pushed the coffee nearer before walking around the bar and sitting cautiously beside him. "I don't intend for this to be a fight."

"Neither do I." She looked almost…relieved? "You have questions, I take it?"

With a nod, she avoided his eyes and stirred her coffee. "I want to know why you did it. What your reasoning was for pursuing me. There's no way I could have known the truth but you—you _knew_ what you did and still sought me out. Why? Was it some sick game to twist the knife deeper into me?"

"No." He answered too quickly and paused to rein in his tone. "It was never about you in that sense. My reasons were purely masochistic at the start. A way to punish myself for the things I'd done. Getting close was meant to torture me, not you."

He had done it on a whim, thick, sludgy guilt settling into the pit of his stomach. It was foreign and strange to approach her, his only experience with acquaintanceship prior being Ren. He said something that made her blush and a feral monster inside his chest howled for more at the sight. Guilty, ashamed, and disgusted with himself, he obliged.

The lead up had been exhilarating, the idea of something so taboo hiding in plain sight. He pulled strings out of pure curiosity until he found himself watching, heart pounding, as her nimble fingers unbuttoned his shirt, her face bathed in alabaster moonlight. Somewhere down the line it had stopped being a game. Somewhere he had allowed his guard to falter. Had grown invested against his better judgement. The end result of the suffocating sexual tension had been delicate, a wisp of a night's breeze. The cold, crisp air of fall, starlight dancing across a placid lake. Cicadas singing in the humid summer dusk.

Their entanglement had been fast and intense, doomed to be bittersweet from the start. He should have expected this, his self control lost in lavender sheets. _It's just once,_ he'd told himself, _your days are numbered and you've always been curious, why not see if it lives up to the hype?_ It was not just once, though he only cried the first time.

She had cracked him open like a prized oyster by accident, the pearl hidden in his depths lustrous but tainted with regret and fear. And she had been beautiful as she did it, eyes gentle and caring even as he crumbled like sandstone in her hands. Lying beside her in the dark, he had let his sorrows fall from lips like a burbling brook, continuous but slow. Timid. Afraid. It was the first glance he offered to her from behind his mask, something he continued to let slip when they were alone. It was freeing to be seen, for once, to be known underneath his shell.

He hadn't anticipated the cruelty or rawness of intimacy, how vulnerable it was, how bare. Her touch had been tender, fingers tightening in his hair as she whispered into his neck how much she wanted him, needed him. In the aftermath he lay awake in her arms, willing himself not to tear up from the overwhelming experience of being cared for.

Even now, months removed, his body was sluggish to forget the feel of her skin, the gentleness of her breath in his hair, the tingling down his spine from her lips pressed to his neck. His hands itched to know her again and he, ashamed, preoccupied them with his cup.

She was quiet for what felt like an eternity. "Did you ever feel anything for me? Beyond the realm of pretend?"

"Yes, of course. You must have noticed I opened up more after we…" He cleared his throat. "After that night."

"None of that was faked?" 

"No." He shook his head quickly and took the first sip of his drink. "You remember how I take my coffee?"

"I made it day after day for over a month; how could I forget?" she said, her voice lost in a shared thought. Sometimes in his kitchen with barely enough room for them both, his hands gliding along her waist. Sometimes in hers late at night, interrupting a waltz danced to the sound of a heartbeat, overhead light dusting her cheeks gold. "Besides, it helps that you're so fussy."

"You can hardly call me fussy when your tea ritual is nearly a religious ceremony." He was flirting before he could stop himself, heart caught between the teeth of her grin. 

"Being particular about steeping the leaves correctly is _much_ less involved than having to weigh out your milk and sugar. Which I did, by the way, if you were wondering."

There was no way she didn't see his hand move on its own accord, the gap between them half bridged as his traitorous nerve endings screamed to touch her. "I appreciate it, I know how bad you are with measurements."

"It was _one_ time! Once! How long will you let this joke drag out?"

"Until it stops making you laugh."

This time she made the mistake but followed through, her fingers finding his. She held his gaze for a few moments until they both pulled slowly away, silence descending like heavy snowfall.

"Why me?" she asked when she found her words again. "There were so many other girls, ones that you wouldn't flay yourself over, why pick me?"

He kept his stare trained down at his steadily-cooling coffee, hands restless with the handle, the saucer, anxiety palpable. "I dislike having to experience other people caring about me. It's like holding my fingertips over a lit candle, uncomfortably hot and painful but not enough to burn. An inconvenience, so I snuff it out. But for some reason, you…" He slowly spun the cup again, watching the liquid ripple. "You were an inferno, searing flesh off my bones with the smallest glance. I felt like Prometheus having my liver torn out every night you spoke to me, punished for daring to linger at the edge of your presence. I saw so much of my own pain in you." He looked up at her, finally. "I've never so willingly doused myself in gasoline."

Her expression softened. "I was a place to hide from everything else exploding around you, wasn't I?"

"I could pretend to be normal with you," he said with a pang of longing. "As if I were just some kid exploring what it meant to care about someone else instead of a bitter creature molded into adulthood at too young an age, too selfish consider the repercussions of my actions. You felt like home, and I wanted so desperately to escape and be okay."

She placed her hand across the counter as if waiting, hoping. "Being with you was the first time I felt like myself, not having to play a shallow character for the sake of vapid suitors, not the perfect demure daughter who did everything she was told, not anyone but me. I had no idea how much I wanted to be that girl until I was standing at your side, unburdened by expectations. I felt limitless but we were ephemeral, mayflies at the end of late August's heat." Her sigh speared straight through his chest. "I struggled for so many nights after, wondering how I'd screwed up so badly, if I'd only been a puppet to you, some source of sick entertainment. The universe kept screwing me over and yet I couldn't cut you out of my ribcage. And I hated myself for it. What I want to know most is if you struggled with it too, if you still think about me."

"I wouldn't have agreed to talk with you alone if I didn't." He brushed the back of her palm with his thumb, running it along her wrist before curling his fingers around hers. When she didn't pull away, he leaned closer. "Falling for you was like sleepwalking; I had no idea it was happening until I found myself completely alert in uncharted territory, unsure of how I'd gotten there."

"It was more natural for me. I felt like I was a flower and the only thing I knew how to do was blossom, so I did. Brilliantly, beautifully." Her voice was stuck in her throat. "It was warm under your sun, and I… I wish I could have stayed there a little longer."

"I don't have much time left, but I'd shine for you again if you asked. If you wanted."

Her arms were around his neck before he could process, his own mutinous grip twisting so tightly into the wool of her coat. She buried her face in his neck and it sent his heart thundering against his ribs.

"I miss you," he said in a near whisper. "More than I'll admit out loud."

"We're a bad idea, we've always been."

"I've had so many bad ideas that ended in misery. I’d prefer one that makes me happy for once."

She pressed her lips to his skin and he shot back, gaze flickering from her mouth to her eyes before meeting her in the middle. Exactly as remembered, her kiss soft but possessive, free fingers curled into his hair, the enveloping scent of vetiver and lilies. Heat pooled in his stomach as warmth tricked up his nerves, the tiny peck on his forehead when it ended sending another wave of tingling sparks down his shoulders. She kept her hand on his chest, his pulse racing beneath her palm.

"My coffee has gone cold," he said softly as she brushed a stray lock behind his ear. "Perhaps we can finish this discussion elsewhere?"

"I'd like nothing more," she said as she stood, taking both cups into the kitchenette.

He held his hand out to her when she returned and pulled her into another kiss, this one longer and a little more hopeful. Lingering when they broke apart, he straightened the collar of her coat before pushing the door open.

Ren stood outside with a massive fish, Morgana's head peeking from his bag. "Perfect timing."

He felt Haru bristle beside him. "What did you see?"

"Nothing I wasn't expecting," he said with a smirk. "Don't worry; I didn't tell the others before and I'm not going to tell them now."

It was his turn to snarl. _"Before?"_

"For two people constantly keeping up appearances, you're both dreadful at subtlety. It's a miracle everyone else is oblivious." He chuckled to himself. "It's going to snow soon. I suggest you get a move on before it starts; supposed to be a big storm." With a wink, he stepped around them and disappeared into the cafe.

"So much for secrecy," she said lamely. 

"I think he's omniscient if I'm honest. He has an answer for everything."

"That pisses you off, doesn't it?"

"Immensely."

"Want to go somewhere warm and vent about it?" She took his hand with a grin. "One caveat, you'll have to spend the night. Can't risk you going home in a blizzard."

It was so easy to fall back into old habits. "That sounds like a scandal."

"Oh, it is; I'm afraid there is only one bed."

"I am willing to risk my image for a night."

"Just _one_ night?"

He stopped, sobering from the humorous mood. "We shouldn't get ahead of ourselves."

Her eyes were as bright as her smile. "It was too fast before, and there’s no reason to rush. We should head home, though; it's starting to snow."

**Author's Note:**

> the title is a vague reference to clair de lune I know it's not a nocturne don't @ me. claudio arrau plays it heart-wrenchingly beautifully - so much yearning in those delicate notes  
> I'm going to go wash my mouth out with gasoline, this was disgustingly sweet eguhegeuhg


End file.
